Many people I know have lost a parent within the last year and a half. Several of them have reached out to offer apologies for not realizing how totalizing the loss of a parent can be.

Aside from telling me more folks than I knew had been talking, it also makes it clear that we still haven't honored the research, the language and the experiences that tell us loss and grief can't be summed up in 5 stages.

Regarding the loss of a parent (I'm speaking specifically about this because it's my context), there is research showing how that death can bring to the surface underlying emotional challenges in profound and dangerous ways.

Things that could have always been there–that showed up and were able to be managed differently–are now amplified in ways that can completely change and reshape the person you are *if not properly addressed and treated.

If that ain't your story, bless a mighty God. That don't make it untrue for other folk, tho.

I was a mess for a good three years after Mama died, unrecognizable even to myself. There are things I did and tried to do, simply in order to feel something because the pain of it all had numbed me to life.

A few days ago, my girl sent me a picture of the two of us from three years ago and I cringed. I looked like every single thing I was going through. I was not okay. I just wasn't. I don't apologize for it or attempt to massage it to make it better. I was a mess.

I was living out my worst nightmare and there was no way to dress that up. A lot of people, whose mothers were very much alive, had a lot to say about how my life unraveled. I considered many of them friends. They are not anymore and I couldn't be happier about that.

People have the right to walk away and you have the right to stand in the sunlight with the people who stayed.

When people who are grieving now circle back and offer apologies now, I tell them there is no need. This is a pain I wouldn't wish on anyone and I will never acknowledge it took this pain to get some folks to become more empathetic, even if it's through accepting an apology.

I watch how folks talk about people who lost a parent. I watch how folks talk about people who lost the parent who cared for them while the absent one is still alive. I watch the conversations and it's heartbreaking. Because some of yall have no idea.

And, instead of saying you have no idea, you just keep talking.